Beatles Film Debut Greeted With Sighs
Early-Rising Girls Wait Long Hours
For Seats of Afternoon Performance

A number of young girls showed up at the Viking Theater at 4 a.m. Wednesday to assure themselves a seat when the show opened after noon. Wayne Berkley, Viking manager, discovered them huddled on his doorstep and invited them in to get warm. Busy with arranging publicity material in the lobby, Berkley asked the girls to help and gave them some large Beatle pictures to move into place.

Berkley is still shaking his head in disbelief. He may not understand the Beatle mystique, but he does know the film packed his house to full capacity Wednesday. Next week, more exclusively adult adulation gets a chance at the Viking when Peter Sellers returns in a sort of sequel of â€œPink Pantherâ€ as he bumbles through â€œA Shot in the Darkâ€. Then it will be the kidsâ€™ chance, perhaps, to shake their heads in disbelief.

I started working at the Viking Theatre in 1991. The theatre closed March 22, 1992. It hadn’t shown a first run movie since 1977. It showed 2nd run films for years, and at its end did not do well. The state of downtown Appleton at the time it closed was not very good. The multiple basements and office space left much to be explored while the films were running. Interestingly enough, you could not enter the projection booth from the theatre itself, you had to exit the theatre and enter a door to the right of the main entrance, this also gave access to the offices upstairs, and the multiple basements below. It sat empty for at least a year, before Route 66 renovated the space for a niteclub.

The Viking was a basic late 40s-style move theater with no balcony. It’s greatest claim is Star Wars played there for nearly six straight months in 1977. Also Marcus occasionally ran soft-core porn flicks at the Viking from time to time in the 70s and early 80s.